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| Marvin Lipofsky |
Launching 2011 with its inaugural exhibition, Project 1:2011 at the LOS ANGELES ART SHOW, Micaëla Gallery + Projects (USA) introduces the following artists: Donata Benker, Marvin Lipofsky, Eugenia Pardue, Lorraine Peltz, Kevin J. Pocock, and Nicole Schmoelzer. Firmly planted in the 21st century, our gallery program embraces the enriched vernacular provided by contemporary fine art approaches to drawing, painting, and sculpture. With an exhibition of paintings addressing ideas, social perceptions (Benker, Pardue, Peltz) and light (Schmoelzer), sculpture (Lipofsky), and video (Pocock), Micaëla Gallery + Projects presents an introduction to Los Angeles of artworks that are as beautiful to regard as they are engaging.
Each artist was carefully chosen because of singular contributions to contemporary visual dialogues.
Kevin Pocock’s videos and digital work often arrive from a process different to his paintings and drawings. Some follow the 'idea and design' process, while others come very spontaneously in the moment. 'The Painted Forest' falls in to the latter category. Pocock was on holiday in Slovakia. With no intention of making this film, he found himself on a quiet descent from a spectacular mountain. Drifting gently past the tree tops of the mountain side forest was a rare, strange and special moments. He was compelled to capture it.
Pocock states: ‘I am fascinated by the thoughts, memories and dreams we carry with us each day. The ones that make us tick. I present these ideas in a semi-abstract, defined architectural space, often using common symbols and elements. I like to incorporate the universal to represent the very personal. Private thoughts made public. The internal made external.’
IMAGE: Kevin J. Pocock. The Painted Forest, 2010. Video still from video with audio. 5 minutes, looped. Ed. x/100.
Lorraine Peltz' work is a continuing discussion of feminine ideas in a fresh, beautiful manner in relation to place and identity. Her vernacular uses recognizable, highly charged images that explore women's fantasies and desires. Peltz' mimicry and reconciliation of how information comes to us and how meaning is made -- real life alongside memory, poetry next to prose -- become the landscapes of her exterior world and an interior space of dream, desire, hope, and memory. Images of chandeliers, among others, co-mingle the language of 17th century-esque still-life objects and pop imageries of lightening bolts, puffy clouds, painted lips, ominous blackbirds, and more. Peltz received her MFA from the University of Chicago. She lives and works in Chicago and teaches at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
IMAGE: Lorraine Peltz. Chandelier Blue, 2010. Oil and acrylic on canvas. 40 x 40 in. Singular.
Marvin Lipofsky, educator, inveterate traveler, multi-awarded artist, respected sculptor, and passionate supporter of the arts, is credited with bridging international communities of artists through ideological barriers, over time and across continents, to become a fundamental pillar of the international glass community. Working with established and respected artists from the Czech Republic, Venice, China and the United States, among others, his collaborative sculptures can be found in important museum and private collections worldwide. A master colorist, Lipofsky's work pays homage to the communities where he created his work. For example, during his visit to the Czech Republic, his sculpture referenced the landscape and political climate, while the work he made during his visit to China used colors that traditionally augur joy and prosperity in Chinese communities. Lipofsky's work also addresses the manner that light shifts through space as well as the effect on space that his work occupies, in terms of color and texture. He established the respected glass programs at the University of California at Berkeley and the California College of Art; and resides in Berkeley, California.
IMAGE: Marvin Lipofsky. California Loop Series #17, 1970. Blown glass. 9 x 27 x 18 in. Singular.
IMAGE: Donata Benker. Pausenhof, 2010. Acrylic, oil, lacquer on canvas. 39.4 x 51.2 in. (100 x 130 cm).
Art Basel Miami Beach's Oceanfront, a public nightly program organized by Creative Time, was beautiful, contemplative and exciting. Phu Hoang Office and Rachely Rotem Studio, designed an environment/pavilion using two types of rope - reflective and phosphorescent – to create an interactive environment of open-air structures that swayed and glowed in the night. The program featured four cities, Detroit, Mexico City, Berlin, and Glasgow, credited as vanguards of today’s alternative and artistic/cross-disciplinary collaboration, with invitations to four organizations to partner in creating the program - the Museum of Contemporary Art (Detroit), Museo Tamayo (Mexico City), 032c (Berlin), and Tramway (Glasgow). Spotlighting film, music, video, performance, the program featured performances by Sue Tompkins, Biba Bell, Isa Melsheimer, Aids-3d, 80*81 (Gerog Diez / Christopher Roth), Stephen Sutcliff, Martin Creed and his band, Daniel Guzman's band Pellejos, Mexico's El Resplandor, and sets by acclaimed DJs from the the four cities. Presentations and discussions were also held by various artists including Pedro Reyes, Claudia Fernandez, Raul Cardenas / Torolab, and Jorge Mendez Blake.
Our first stop was Pulse, where we fell in love with Silverlens Gallery's new group of artists, such as Manila-based Geraldine Javier and her diptych, Snow (2010 diptych, oil on canvas, collage, embroidery, 54 x 45 in/137.16 x 114.3 cm each panel), pairing representational oil painting with collage and embroidery.
Our San Francisco neighbor, Catherine Clark Gallery featured Al Farrow's architecture (Bombed Mosque, 2010, guns, bullets, steel, 40 x 56 x 34 in), and video by Marina Zurkow (Elixir I-II, 2010, Single-channel digital video, custom electronics: monitor, USB drive, MPLayer, custom frame, 24 x 15 x 3 inches). Catherine Clark generously provided us with a short clip of the gallery's video program to view and consider.
Lastly, Portland's Elizabeth Leach Gallery’s installation by Malia Jensen, Salty (carved salt lick and digital video, 12 minutes, edition x/10), combined mammary (yes, that's right, mammary) salt sculptures with a slightly disturbing video.
We are grateful for these artworks.
Emboldened, the year-end art fairs held during last week’s Art Basel Miami fest included several offerings of glass sculpture for the acquisition-minded collector.
Among the sculptures shown were works by American glass sculpture titan, Marvin Lipofsky (left) Soviet Series 1989, blown and sandblasted glass, presented by San Francisco’s Micaela Gallery at SCOPE Art Show, Bullseye Gallery’s exclusive presentation of glass sculpture at Art Miami (showing April Surgent, Jessica Loughlin, and Richard Whiteley, among others), Yoichi Ohira, the Murano expatriot from Japan, showed elegant forms (represented by Barry Friedman), and lastly the cast glass work of Nicolas Africano (represented by Nancy Hoffman Gallery).
Why are we excited about finding glass sculpture in the rarefied halls of Art Basel? Primarily, because the world of the glass sculptor is strangely insular, often isolated from more commonly accepted fine art mediums such as bronze and painting. Some would attribute this to its modern association with craft; however, the excruciating labor required to master the medium, its mystique dating back to the Crusades, and most recently, pockets of artists sequestered in the Pacific Northwest and Northeastern Atlantic coasts, as well as remote areas of Denmark (Ebeltoft) and Italy (Murano) are the more likely reasons. The communal nature of mastering glass sculpture requires like-minded artists, wholly dedicated to the fragile and fickle medium of their choice, and while a lucky few have been inducted into the collections of the Smithsonian and the Museum of Modern Art, most glass sculptors have retained unusual independence from art world trends, and have been steadfastly working at developing their art, honing their vision and preparing for their moment of fame. As a result, until recently, the glass sculptor seems to have received only a sideways glance from strict formalists who clung to the didactic that glass sculpture is a craft not a fine art - never mind that today’s contemporary glass sculptor marches in step with works by Christopher Wilmarth, Larry Bell, Josiah McIlheny, Judith Schaechter, and Bella Feldman, among others.
Sculpture continues to receive a warm embrace by the international art crowd during Art Basel week – whether in Basel or Miami - as evidenced by a proliferation of works by Anish Kapoor, the introduction of the above-named glass sculptors – Lipofsky, Surgent, Whitely, Ohira and Africano – and who will forget California artist Pae White’s Art Basel commissioned city block long installation inspired by the shanty towns of Mumbai, Rio and Shanghai?
Someone asked me if I saw a trend with the arrival of glass at Miami’s Art Basel this year. Well, one didn’t have to look far, as it seems every fair from Art Basel, Art Miami, Design Miami (The Swarovski Crystal Palace installation featuring more than 1,500 crystals on display as the leading piece of artwork), PULSE and SCOPE showed glass sculpture in some form or another. The truth is, when the tired old arguments of its medium are removed, glass, like any sculpture, when expertly used, is a beautifully captivating material that possesses a particularly unique relationship with light. 2009 is a good year to welcome glass as an accepted medium for fine contemporary artmaking. It’s a good year to have such a wealth of glass sculpture presented to the art world cognocenti.
FirstView
Wednesday, December 2 | 11am-6pm
Free for VIPs or $100 donation to benefit The SCOPE Foundation
PressView
Wednesday, December 2 | 11am-6pm
VIP Cocktail Reception
Wednesday, December 2 | 4-6pm
General Admission Fair Hours
Thursday-Saturday | December 3 - 5 | 11am-7pm
Sunday | December 6 | 11am-6pm
SCOPE Art Show Inaugurates its First Curatorial Committee
David Hunt, Independent Curator and Critic, New York
Franklin Sirmans, Chief Curator of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles County Museum of Art
Naomi Beckwith, Assistant Curator, The Studio Museum in Harlem, New York
Kate McNamara, Curatorial Assistant, PS1 / MOMA, New York
Benjamin Godsill, Curatorial Associate, New Museum, New York
SCOPE Curatorial Committee Presents: The SCOPE Film Program
Wednesday, December 2 | 11am-6pm
Patty Chang, Rather To Potentialities, 2009
Thursday, December 3 | 11am-7pm
Edgar Arceneaux, An Arrangement without Tormentors, 2004
Friday, December 4 | 11am-7pm
Robert Boyd, Conspiracy Theory, 2008
Saturday, Decem
ber 5 | 11am-7pm
Jordan Wolfson, Infinite Melancholy, 2003
Sunday, December 6 | 11am-6pmKon Trubkovich, Double Entrance/Double Exit, 2009
SCOPE Presents: The Arctic Circle
Wednesday, December 2- Sunday, December 6
SCOPE Presents: The SCOPE Sculpture Garden
Wednesday, December 2- Sunday, December 6
From December 3 through 6, 2009, Miami Beach, Florida, will be home to the 8th edition of Art Basel Miami Beach, the international art show. More than 250 leading galleries from North America, Europe, Latin America, Asia and Africa will take part. Chosen by renowned gallerists of the Art Basel Miami Beach Selection Committee, the galleries will show works by more than 2,000 artists of the 20th and 21st centuries. Special sectors are devoted to very recent artworks, curated exhibits, performance, and art in public spaces.
This year, the layout of Art Basel Miami Beach will be extensively redesigned, including larger spaces for many galleries, and a new floorplan designed to improve the gallery exhibition and visitor experience inside the convention center. Art Galleries, the main section of the show, will feature more than 180 galleries from all continents.
For Art Basel Miami Beach 2009 the Selection Committee has chosen 28 galleries to present an Art Kabinett - separate areas within the booths of the Art Galleries sector, providing a space to exhibit both single artists' works and thematic group exhibitions spotlighting the curatorial skills of the gallerists. The projects in this sector of the show feature a wide array of artists, ranging from emerging artists such as Jakub Julian Ziotkowski, Haegue Yang and Latifa Echakhch to historical figures like Marcel Duchamp, George Grosz and Jack Tworkov. Further highlights include projects by Olafur Eliasson, Anish Kapoor, Richard Prince and Wim Delvoye. Group shows include exhibitions titled “Ninety Years of Bauhaus” and “Aspects of Pop Art”.
The Art Nova sector serves as a platform for the galleries of Art Basel Miami Beach to present works produced in the last two years, by a maximum of three artists. This year 64 international galleries have been chosen for the sector by the Selection Committee. Works by more than 130 artists from around the globe are on display, including 17 solo shows, featuring artists such as Marc Bijl, Valie Export, Rashid Rana, Dan Attoe, Michael Beutler, Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian, Jose Dávila and Marine Hugonnier.
The Art Positions sector - focuses on special projects by young artists and galleries, and formerly situated at Collins Park - will now be sited in the center of the Miami Beach Convention Center and features works by artists such as Renate Lorenz, Falke Pisano, Ulla von Brandenburg, Agathe Snow, Egill Saebjornsson, Reena Spaulings and Marcel Broodthaers.
Art Projects, curated for the first time this year by independent curator Patrick Charpenel of Guadalajara, Mexico, features 13 projects by internationally renowned artists such as Santiago Sierra, Claire Fontaine, William Pope.L, Rirkrit Tiravanija, and Franz West, selected from proposals by the galleries of Art Basel Miami Beach. The projects will be installed in the outdoor public spaces of Miami Beach, within close proximity to the Oceanfront area and the Miami Beach Convention Center.
The totally new Oceanfront environment will be created by Los Angeles artist Pae White, commissioned by Art Basel Miami Beach and Creative Time, the legendary New York-based public art organization, and host a daily program including the Art Basel Conversations, Art Perform, Art Video and Art Film. For the 2009 premiere of the Oceanfront, Pae White will create an immersive and interactive cityscape that will provide a new experience with each visit. By day, large color blocks will dominate the landscape. At night, these colors blocks transform into a shadowy group of buildings that house various merchants and performers.
Now located at the Oceanfront, the Art Basel Conversations will be inaugurated by an Artist Talk premiere, which this year features Chinese artist Ai Weiwei. For the following Art Basel Conversations, topics include “Museum Directors: Change in Generation”, “Art Collections in Latin America” and “The Future of the Museum: The Portable Museum”.
Art Video, curated by Creative Time, will involve screenings of videos by Tom Sachs and The Neistat Brothers, Marc Horowitz, Jill Magid, Kon Trubkovich, followed by discussions with the artists.
Art Perform features an intensified program of longer performances by rising international artists. This program will again be conceived by curator Jens Hoffmann, director of the CCA Wattis Institute, San Francisco. It will take place on Thursday and Saturday at 9 pm and feature performances by Kelly Nipper, Kris Martin, Simon Fujiwara, Claire Fontaine, and Mario Garcia Torres / Loris Gréaud.
This year's Art Film event offers an exclusive work-in-progress sneak preview of the feature documentary film “Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child.”, preceded by a panel with a selection of the film's participants, moderated by Bob Colacello. “Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child” is directed by Tamra Davis and features a long and never-before-seen interview with Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988) shortly before his death. Art Film is curated by Zurich film connaisseur This Brunner.
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Yesterday was my first day at Art Basel 2009. Psyched, burning with desire, I couldn’t wait to pay my entrance, get past the bag inspections, and into the halls of this year’s trove of contemporary fine art! Whoo-hoo. As a with Art Miami|Basel, this is a big deal, the grand hoo-ha, when the crème de la crème mingle with the stars of our contemporary fine art world – it’s quite a show: the artwork, the artists, the galleries and their gallerists, and yes, let’s face it, the celebs (there is a shivery thrill to seeing a bona fide celeb walking in and plunking down disgusting amounts of cash for a painting).
Who’s here from San Francisco (my home town) and what did they bring? As soon as I could tear off the plastic wrap from the massive catalog, I found listings for John Berggruen’s gallery, Crown Point, Fraenkel, Anthony Meier Fine Arts, and Ratio 3. Wow. Five galleries from Ess Eff? Sniff.
Anthony Meier Fine Arts showed a lot of Gerhard Richter. My favorites: small framed oil and lacquer embellished photographs on the exterior wall of his booth, although what actually drew me into his booth was the Yayoi Kusama on the wall. Nice cool pale grays with texture. Work by Gary Simmons caught my roving eye too. Berggruen brought work by a wide range of artists, including Mark di Suvero. High polished sculpture with dull metal contrasts, strong, masculine shapes. Nice. Interestingly juxtaposed with a large, slightly crumpled drawing by Kiki Smith on thin exotic paper, pinned to the wall. Nearby, almost hidden: a sweet and creamy little cupcake oil by Wayne Thiebaud. Wayne Eggleston at Fraenkel. Go see.
The fair is huge and yesterday was a long day. San Francisco to Basel by way of Philadelphia, London and Zurich… I’m here for some really good eye candy and hope to find the cool factor. So, it seems, do the mobs in attendance. The first floor, dominated by big players from Berlin, London, New York and Paris, presented an abundance of Anish Kapoor, Joan Miro, Andy Warhol, Picasso, Nolde, Egon Schiele, so much, in fact, it felt like an exhibition at the SFMoMA. Like New York’s Armory Show, it presented a strong modernist, and conservative, exhibition. It seems the second floor is where I’ll find the more contemporary galleries. Going hunting today.
What else did I like? Shimmering silk embroidery stretched over canvas frames and blown glass installation by Angelo Filomeno. Bright large panels that reminded me of Keith Haring at first glance turned out to be large embroidered panels by Alighiero e Boetti (Tutto). Candida Hoyer’s beautiful C-Prints, Bill Viola’s elegant small-scale video presentation (Small Saints, 2008) presented hypnotic social commentary with flawless visuals. Jaume Plensa sculptures at Richard Gray and Lelong Galleries, and enchanting three-channel video by the Russian artists AES+F for Noire Contemporary Art. Very cool.
Today is another day, and I’m off to find Ratio3, revisit my SF neighbors, and check out the offerings at SCOPE, a satellite fair. It’s a beautiful day, sunny, the air is crisp, the coffee is amazing, the pastries delicious, and the Swiss great hosts!
